DS823: Biodemografi, fremskrivning og populationsdynamik

Bestået bachelorgrad.

Requirements for this course are knowledge of basic statistics and mathematics. A basic knowledge of R software is also expected (a basic free online course on R is found in cousera: https://www.coursera.org/course/rprog)

This is an introductory course in biodemography. Lectures on biodemographic methodologies and are followed by hands-on exercises using relevant data sources. The course also includes recent methodologies and debates in population studies.

The course will give the student skills in biodemographic theory, methods and use. The course explicitly focus on:

• The link between demography and health science
• Methodologies used in biodemography
• Data analysis of data in a biodemographic perspective
• As a data scientist knowledge on health data and their use is important. 

Generel competences:

• Knowledge about the needs and opportunities of the specialization when working with and processing data
• Competences in selecting, applying, and combining the right programming, statistics, and machine learning tools and methods to work with data relevant for the specialization
• Skills in managing complex work and development situations in the areas of data processing and analysis as well as starting up and executing analyses

• To have a thorough understanding of rates and their importance in demography
• To recognize the relevant settings for basic demographic methods.
• To have knowledge of standard demographic data resources.
• To be able to perform standard demographic analyses in R.
• To be aware of standard pitfalls in demographic (health) research.

This course sets out the basic skills and concepts that a data scientist should have when dealing with demographic data. We refresh the centrally important concept of rates, as well as the relationship of demography with statistics. We then turn to basic methods in demography, as well as basic data resources. We discuss basic demographic visualization tools and explore methods to deal with problematic data. Finally, we venture into some applications of demography, such as evolutionary demography and forecasting.

Der vil være 8 forelæsninger på 45 minutter efterfulgt af øvelser designet til at støtte forelæsningerne. Efter underviserens skøn kan forelæsninger og øvelser blandes. Studerende opfordres til at sende deres arbejde til feedback.